Une fois de plus bonjour tout le monde !!!
This has been one of the more interesting weeks of my mission. Monday was my last P-Day in my sector, and since I only had another day to say all my goodbyes I tried to see one of our recent converts that night, but she wasn’t even there. So to make up for my disappointment we set up an epic mattress fort in the hall and strung it with Christmas lights and it was amazing. We tried sleeping under it, but aroudn 1 in the morning I woke up to about 1093 mostquitoes fighting for posession of my body, so I got up and to sleep in my normal bed. It was pretty anticlamatic.
My last day in Akwa was pretty great. I got to see Marcelle, who fed us of course and then gave me a Cameroun jersey which is sweet. Then we saw Christiane and Nicole, and headed out with the Gaileys to pick up the new missionaries : Elders Wright and Beutler ! They’re both awesome. So fresh. So green. And so tan...since we’ve been in the rainy season and they spent the MTC under the sun, they’re both more tan than we are. It was weird. But they’re excited to be here and ready to learn, which is great. I’m excited to watch them grow! I had another realization moment when I noticed that in just a few short months I’ll be one of the older missionaries in the field. I’m alread the one who’s been in Douala the longest! Everyone else has moved on. This is my home. I love it. I’m so glad I stayed, even if it’s on the other side of the bridge. Everyone thinks we’ll still see each other, but in reality I’ll probably go another 3 transfers or so without seeing more than 2 or 3 people that I taught, and only because I’ll go to their baptisms (hopefully!).
So I spent my first night in Bonabéri that night, where Andriamamonjy made us Malgash soup and I slept really well until our branch missionary Barthelemy started snoring and sniffing with an incredible force. The next morning Elder Massé and I unscrewed the bunk beds and moved them into another room. For Angy’s last day before going home to Madagascar we went back into Akwa and saw some of the people he taught, including some Malgash people he met a couple months ago. When we walked into their shop I saw this really nice Nikon D7000 on the desk and said, “hey I’m sort of a photographer too!” and they started going off in Malgash, and Angy says, “they want you to help them take pictures of this hotel that they’re installing lights in...” sooo for the next 45 minutes we followed Angy’s friend around and he had me take pictures of the interieur and exterieur of this hotel. Then they started asking me for tips on how to take a good picture and were ooh’ing and ahh’ing over the pictures I was taking, which were not by any means wonderful. I felt really bad because it kindof turned into a ‘me show’ when it was Angy’s last day. We got a Sprite out of it though, so it was totally worth it. Then 3 more people that he wanted to see weren’t even home, but he said he had an awesome last day and thanked us for coming around with him. P.S. one of our taxi drivers heard Elder Massé speaking English to us and asked him if by any chance he was a descendant of Hitler. So that was pretty hilarious.
The next day we had a special zone conference in honor of Angy’s leaving, so we all talked about how much we loved him and had this big lunch before he was whisked away on a bus to Yaoundé to catch his final flight home. It was nuts. I’d never seen anyone die before (mission term for when someone goes home). I cried, duh. I’m not good at saying goodbye to people, especially orally. I’m pretty good at waving, but don’t count on me opening my mouth because it will most likely be incomprehensible blubbering.
When we got home Massé and I talked about how we wanted to organize our new sector which neither of us know, and we organized our new rooms and got really nerdy with our megadesk. I was finally able to unpack everything and move in all my junk that I had gathered from Akwa.
Friday was the wedding. We were told that it was moved from 2 to 11, so we left early, got there and found no one. Right as we were walking in we got a call that it was actually at 2, so we went to my old apartment and they told us that we needed to be there at 1, but when we got there 2 hours later we were still the only ones. More than an hour went by before the next people showed up, and another 2 hours before the Tignyembs finally came. I’m used to African Standard Time, but that was ridiculous. Patience is truly a vertu. So we watched them get married by this old mayor guy and it was actually really sweet. They were FINALLY married. Everyone was cheering and laughing and crying (but I was all cried out from the day before) and it was just beautiful. Afterwards one of our member friends bought us a little plate of crocodile to eat, which was delicious and tasted yes, just like chicken. Oh and on the way home we saw a taxi that said on the bumper “My name is Jack Bauer.”
Then came the baptism. We got to meet some of our friends and members who live around the apartment before heading out there, but I’m still lost all day until we cross the bridge back into Akwa. We were there on time at 2, and so was everyone else—BUT the married couple. So for another, and I kid you not, THREE hours we waited for them to show up. Why were they late? The wife was getting her hair done...right before getting dunked in a pool of water. The ceremony lasted forever, but it was awesome. Six baptisms, testimonies by the father and oldest daughter, another marriage ceremony before God where our Anglophone friend gave a talk that lasted way too long that thankfully he said he cut short due to lack of time that inlcuded things like, “your wife is like a television—you need to watch only her, and you need to love to watch your husband. And love is like childhood—you need to learn to share,” among many other catchy phrases like that. SO, 4 hours later everyone was surrounding a giant table eating lots of food and being happy and celebrating and it was so fun and so happy. I loved every second of it after it finally started. Oh and on the way home we saw a motorcycle carrying a guy who was balancing, no joke, another motorcycle across his lap. #AFRICA
Sunday was great. I met a lot of the members, despite the fact that no one asked me to bear my testimony during sacrament, and the warmth and love felt the same as it was back in Akwa, thank goodness. The only problem was that I had split my middle finger across the finger print somehow, which made shaking everyone’s hand impossibly painful because they always do this snap at the end of the handshake right where I have the split. Otherwise, it was a great church service, except that priesthood is now at the end and they talk until like 12:30. Everyone has to have the last word haha.
We taught a member’s friend, which was the first time Elder Massé and I got to teach together. He’s a great missionary and teaches well, so I’m pumped to continue working with him.
There are some things about Bonabéri that I appreciate more than Akwa. For example, I haven’t taken a hot shower in the last 6 months, but I took my first one about 6 days ago. It was a wonderful thing. I forgot how awesome it was. Another thing is air conditioning. I don’t have to sleep with a fan, and mosquitos don’t really come into our apartment so no more annoying net all over my face at night. I also get to sleep with the blanket that I brought, which was way too hot back in Akwa. Since our sector is so small, we don’t take any taxis, but we walk everywhere. I love that. Since there’s no taxis and no traffic, there’s no noise at night including no karaoke and I sleep like a baby. They make their own yogurt and eat it with cereal for breakfast instead of milk. It’s delicious and now I know how to make yogurt :) Angy left his red fanny pack behind, so now I’m super stylin and my shirts aren’t half as nasty as they usually are after a day’s work. I love my companions. They’re super cooperative and reasonable and clean and nice and hilarious and charitable and hard workers. I’m sure I’ll have more things to write about next week, but until then I want you to know that leaving behind a sector with converts and investigators and friends from church really, really, really sucks. I miss them so much already. I remember being in their position when the missionaries who taught me left, and it was really weird for me. I love these people so much, I can’t even describe. When you’re giving your all to something, heart and soul, and then you have to leave it behind you know what I’m talking about. Thankfully I can still call and write them and they’re not too far! It’ll be worse when I get transfered to Yaoundé or Congo or Gabon (which still isn’t open yet). Just know that I miss them all because I’m putting my all into this work! I wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world (except maybe a Bigmac and strawberry shake oh my...), but I was thinking about why the heck wouldn’t I do that with everything I do back home? I decided to put my everything into everything I do, and that way I’ll get the most out of this life. I encourage you to do the same thing! If you’re doing the dishes, wash the heck out of em! Why not?! Maybe I’m becoming a creepy missionary, but seriously! Don’t do anything half axed ! Put your heart and soul into scrubbing that table, or vacuuming that floor, or making that sandwich, or swinging on that swing! You will love it and you will love life. Heck, I’m in one of the poorest places in the world, and these people LOVE life. They are smiling and singing all day as they hang their clothes that they washed by hand and as they sweep their dirt floors. What’s your excuse?
ALL my love,
Elder Garland
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